“Some of us believe that Australia is already a form of republic under the Crown: a "crowned republic". Australia now enjoys all the desirable features of a republican government and a constitutional monarchy without any disadvantages of either system. Agitation for change is unnecessary, irrelevant, divisive and distracting.”

In this way many prominent constitutional monarchists and some prominent republicans, including judges , professors, senior lawyers and politicians use this terminology or consider it acceptable. They include John Howard, Michael Kirby, Tony Abbott, and Justice Ken Handley.

Republicans are always rushing into the media although they admit they still have not worked out what sort of politicians' republic they are pushing. They are even doing it for the coming Royal Visit, according to a report by Tim Barrass in The Sun-Herald on 9 March 2014.

Apparently they are going to ''restart'' the conversation. People are asking just how many relaunches and restarts you can have?

Wouldn't you think they would just go away and work out what the constitution and the flag would look like in their republic before they released another non-story to the media? Most Australians are pretty happy with their crowned republic.

"I, ANTHONY JOHN ABBOTT, do swear that I will well and truly serve the people of Australia in the office of prime minister and that I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, Queen of Australia. So help me God!''

So swore the Prime Minister of Australia, the former and foundation Executive Director, Australians for Constitutional Monarchy, the Hon. Tony Abbott MP. (We are publishing the text of the Oath here on the suggestion of Councillor Peter Cavanagh, a great ACM supporter.)

....constitutional position...

The Oath of Office for The Queen's Ministers of State now correctly reflects the constitutional position which was approved by the people and affirmed by them in the 1999 landslide.

ACM warmly congratulates Mr. Abbott for the propriety of his decision to advice the Governor-General on the correct Oath of Office.

Paul Keating, Kevin Rudd, Julia Gillard and Kevin Rudd (again) regretfully removed any reference to the allegiance they all owe to their sovereign and which they swore whenever they took their seats. It is difficult to understand what they thought they would achieve by this, apart from enjoying the approval of the small number of obsessed individuals who hate the Australian Crown.

...reflection required....

This playing around with the Oath in no way changed their allegiance, nor did it change the constitution. In fact it indicated that they did not approve of the people's refusal in 1999 to endorse the politicians' republic, not the position which should be adopted in our democracy.

When they received the great honour of being invited by the Governor-General to form a government on the basis of their parliamentary support which reflected the votes of the people, they should have reflected on one fact.

This is that all of the great leaders of the Australian Labor Party not only swore allegiance, they meant it as they all supported our constitutional monarchy or, if you will, our crowned republic.

One of the very few countries where for well over one and a half centuries, governments in Australia have changed without violence, coups, revolutions and dictatorships. We have just seen this in Canberrra, where, incidentally, the Oath of Allegiance has been restored. This correctly reflects the constitutional position approved and affirmed by the people.

Under international law the Vatican City is a state. It is distinct from the Holy See, the episcopal jurisdiction of the Catholic Church in Rome. The Bishop of Rome enjoys a primacy over other Catholic bishops and is Pope.

Unlike the Vatican City, the Holy See is not a state but has long enjoyed international legal personality- longer than almost all modern states and longer than all other organisations enjoying international legal personality. Ambassadors including Australia's are accredited to the Holy See. The Holy See is a state party to a number of international conventions or treaties, and enjoys permanent observer status at the United Nations.

...elective monarchy...

The Vatican City is an elective monarchy, in which the head of the Catholic Church, the Pope or Supreme Pontiff, is the Sovereign. As such His Holiness enjoys the fullness (or plenitude) of legislative, executive and judicial powers (Article 1: Fundamental Law) .

The Vatican City is thus an elective and absolute monarchy, one which is obviously not hereditary.

...republic & head of state...

This example of monarchy demonstrates the fallacy in a constitutional debate of attempting to limit the meaning of words so as to fit a political agenda. We see this in the attempts of those wishing to remove the Australian Crown of imposing their agenda driven restrictive meaning of the word “republic”.

To describe the Commonwealth Australia as a republic, albeit a crowned republic, is not erroneous. The term “head of state” is somewhat different as it already has a technical meaning in customary international law.

...Humpty Dumpty...

Those who want significant constitutional change – even if it is negative rather than positive – will not persuade the Australian people by what is no more than a Humpty Dumpty attempt to limit the meaning of words to fit their agenda. Unwilling to reveal their plans for the constitution and the Flag, like Humpty Dumpty, they wish to be the masters.

'When I use a word,' Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, 'it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.

''The question is,' said Alice, 'whether you can make words mean so many different things.

The Australian published a reply to their editorial on 7 February under their heading, " Our crowned republic":

You say in your editorial praising the Queen (6/2) that a different monarch would almost certainly have seen Australia become a republic long ago.

Have you forgotten that the republican charge in 1999 was that monarchists were not mentioning the Queen? The suggestion was that doing so would damage our case because of the matrimonial problems of some members of the royal family.

The fact is, our case was always 100 per cent based on the constitution and not on the virtues of the Queen who was neutral in the campaign.

If republicans demonstrated one thing in 1999, it was the inability of their best minds to construct a model superior to our present crowned republic.